An agronomist and managing director, Jarfathad Farms, Minna, Niger State, Mr Garba Attahiru Madami, has said that Nigerian yams are being rejected at foreign markets due to high toxicity when tested because of the excessive use of inorganic fertiliser and herbicides used during production.
He said farmers should, instead of inorganic fertiliser and herbicides, use neem seeds as alternative to grow their yams, saying that yams produced using the latter were toxic-free when exported and tested.
Mr Madami, a former agricultural science lecturer at the Niger State College of Education with over 30-year experience in research in yam production, revealed that Nigeria produced more yams than Ghana, but Ghana exports more.
“Ghana exports more yams than Nigeria because they have found that the yams produced in Nigeria have high toxicity of inorganic fertilisers and the chemicals we use,” he explained.
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He said Nigerian farmers needed to adopt the right production mechanisms to produce yam that meet the taste of global markets, while also calling on the government to come in to encourage best practices in producing crops that are free of toxicity for exportation.
Speaking with Daily Trust on Sunday, Madami lamented that federal and state governments were not doing anything in the area of training and retraining of farmers in evolving farming practices that improve both the productivity of farmers and revenue for the government from agriculture.
“When you export any food out of the country, whether beans, maize, yam or any other type of food, what they do, apart from meeting the standard in terms of size, the weight, the cleanness and so on, they are tested for toxicity effect of the chemicals used or pesticides used for production. Those chemicals, either from fertiliser or herbicides, are always in the food. And it is always detected in Nigerian yams and other foods because we use most of these fertilisers. We use herbicide and other chemicals, and that has always made the foods we produce rejected in the international market.
“So, one of the ways to solve that problem is to revert to the use of neem seeds in replacement of organic pesticide and herbicide. Apart from rubbing neem seed powder on yam seeds before planting, you can also spray it to kill insects on your farm instead of using insecticides.
Neem is a broad-spectrum organic pesticide. India has done so much research on the neem tree. Neem tree has a quiname that even cures malaria. Neem seed is what I have been using for years now to produce my yams. I have them in sacks. It costs nothing because neem trees are everywhere. Recently, I just gave N25,000 to labourers to help me pack them. Currently, a 1kg cartoon of herbicide, containing 10 bottles cost N64,000 in the market. So, we should go organic to keep us healthy and boost our production and to give us more money in terms of foreign exchange.
“We need to go organic to save lives and for safety because a lot of these organic foods we consume are the major causes of kidney failure, cancer and several other diseases. So, it is healthier and climate-friendly when you use neem seeds to grow your yam.
“The herbicide we use to produce yam is not readily available because it is imported. But we have to look inward because some of these fertilisers and herbicides we use on our farms cause kidney failure, cancer and other diseases.
“We have to start thinking of ways to address these issues by changing the pattern of farming. I decided to use neem leaves and seeds and found out that the chemical in the seeds is more effective than the one in leaves. So, I adopted the neem seed. So, instead of dressing the yam seeds with inorganic chemicals, I now dress the seed with neem slurring and it worked perfectly. With that, the produce you can export will be toxic-free. And toxicity is one of the reasons exporters are rejecting agricultural produce and food from Nigeria. There is a residual effect of the herbicides and fertilisers we use for growing our crops.
Mr Garba Attahiru Madami also said the adoption of mini-set yam seeds by farmers would also increase production capacity of yam farmers across yam- producing states. And it is the best way to boycott the rising cost of yam seedlings as farmers begin preparation for wet season.
Recent checks by Daily Trust on Sunday showed that 100 tubers of yam seedlings, popularly known as ‘kwariya’ cost between N120,000 and N150,000, with farmers complaining that the price has continued to go up on a daily basis.
With mini-set yam technology, the expert said yam production in Niger State and other yam-producing states would improve, especially now that the cost of seedlings has risen higher in the market.
The expert, who said he was ready to impart the knowledge on the farmers to improve their productivity and increase in their annual returns, lamented that government at all levels were paying lip service to the empowerment of farmers, especially yam-producing states.
“If our farmers are equipped with requisite knowledge through training and re-training, if they are producing 5,000 yearly before, they can now produce 10,000 because one of the advantages of the mini-set yam production is that you can do mass production at less cost.
“Many extension workers don’t even have this knowledge. So, they need to also be trained so that they can continue to train farmers in their respective communities.
“We have many states like Niger, Nasarawa and Benue that produce yam in large quantities, and if farmers can be trained on using the organic method of producing it, we can begin to produce for export, which will not only generate foreign exchange for our farmers but even to the government.
“The first thing you do is to look for good yam seeds; that is the most important thing. Now, yam seeds are very expensive. It costs you N150,000 to get 100 pieces of yam. With the current economic situation, how many farmers can afford that, for God’s sake? But if farmers can adopt innovation and do it themselves and know how to produce their own seeds, and if possible, sell, it will ease and improve their production and yield.
“I remember that in 2010 I was surviving on a yam mini-set, getting nothing less than N4 million from the sale of seed yam alone. I was specialising in it and was making my money. The only problem was that you would have to wait annually. Mini-yam seed has been tested and proven to be of high yielding capacity.
“In 2010 when I retired as a lecturer from the Niger State College of Education, I went into yam production and started with 1,000 heaps and experimented. I did my own research on yam mini-set technology, cut the yam into pieces, and in the first year, most of them got rotten. Then, I realised through literature that I had to apply broad spectrum fungicide and was able to get 100 per cent germination. The following year, I decided to try organic farming and used neem seeds, which I grinded into powder and mixed it with water and made it thick. I used it and also got 100 per cent germination. The neem you see is a broad-spectrum pesticide. There are a lot of things because even the oil is medicinal; the whole thing about neem trees is medicinal and organic.
“Where a farmer prefers to use inorganic fertiliser, it is not everything you apply to yam. The fertiliser recommended for yam production is 15-15-15 NPK (15 per cent Nitrogen, 15 per cent phosphorus, 15 per cent potassium), which is known as ‘compound fertiliser’. With that, the storage of your yam would also be better. But thank God, we now have liquid organic fertilisers, which can be applied to the leaves; and leaves absorb it and grow well. So, if you use the organic fertiliser, when they are checking for toxicity especially if you are exporting. it cannot be detected.
He said the tonnes of yam produced in Niger State had reduced due to banditry and insurgency that have displaced farmers from many yam farming communities, adding that the state produces yam in 15 local government areas – Gurara, Bosso, Tafa, Suleja, Chanchaga, Shiroro, Munya, Paikoro, Wushishi, Lapai, Agaie, Rafi, Bida, Katcha and Lavun.
He said another challenge facing yam production in the state was inadequate seed and lack of quality varieties of yam sets.
“The third challenge why yam production in Niger State has reduced significantly is that farmers don’t even have the money for seed yams now because of its rising cost. This is why it is important to train farmers on mini-set yam seed so that they can make seeds themselves in a way that they cannot incur wastages. I have just told you that 50 tubers of yam would give you about 750 seeds if you adopt mini-set yam technology and 100 tubers will give you over 1, 000 seeds. So, if the government can train these farmers and empower them with at least 200 tubers of yam each, it will increase production,” he added.
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